‘Canada’s folk laureate’ Gordon Lightfoot turns 80

This Nov. 17 marks Gordon Lightfoot’s 80th birthday, and the singer-songwriter has chosen to celebrate the milestone by giving a gift to his hometown.

He’s making a stop in Orillia, Ont., on his birthday, to perform a benefit concert for the Opera House and the Orillia Soldiers’ Memorial Hospital.

Telescope host Fletcher Markle summed up Lightfoot as “a country boy whose home territory encouraged an awareness of nature and weather, and the simplicity of open spaces that is echoed lyrically in many of his songs.”

‘The country that I grew up in’

Lightfoot talked with Telescope about the influence of of the countryside of his boyhood on his music, as he sat, surrounded by the rocks of the Canadian Shield.

He went on to explain that the “little landscapes, or images” that come up in all his songs are not particular images, but just a backdrop for the “idea and the concept that you’re working on.”

‘I dig Canada’

A couple of years later, Lightfoot sat with some Vancouver teens on CBC-TV’s Down Centre, and talked about how writers and performers like himself brought folk music into the mainstream.

One young woman asked him when he first started to write songs about Canada.

“They’re not specifically about Canada, you see … I’ve never contrived a Canadian song.”

Lightfoot clarified that “there were a few times when I wrote novelty songs, but it’s the atmosphere of Canada that are in the songs.”

He added: “The fact that I am a Canadian and that I dig Canada and the landscape of Canada and the geography and everything, just comes out in these songs.”

Gord’s Gold, sculpted in bronze

In 2015, a bronze sculpture honouring Lightfoot was unveiled in Orillia.

It depicts a young, bearded Lightfoot, seated with a guitar, surrounded by maple leaves.

Some of the leaves have pictures that depict the 20 songs from his album Gord’s Gold.

Lightfoot was present for the unveiling. Asked how he liked the concept of the depiction of his songs on the leaves, he was enthusiastic in his appreciation for them, pointing out that it was particularly appropriate on a beautiful autumn day in Orillia.